Hot Wheels: The First Movie
Hot Wheels: The First Movie is a 1999 Canadian-American computer-animated action-adventure fantasy film based on Hot Wheels toy cars and video games by Mattel. Directed by Dick Zondag and Steve Ball, it is Vancouver-based production company Mainframe Entertainment 's first full length theatrical film. The film featured the voices of Tobey Maguire, John Hurt, Angelina Jolie, Freddie Prince, Jr., Paul Walker, Christian Bale, Ali Larter, Lorenzo Music, Scott Caan, Jon Voight and Tony Jay. The plot centres on a band of drivers led by Jack "Rabbit" Wheeler who team up with a group of street racers called Sky Drivers to stop a terrorist woman named Cortana from taking over the world. Development first started in 1996. Distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, the film was released on November 17, 1999. Hot Wheels: The First Movie received very positive reviews, and was a box office hit, topping the box office charts in its opening weekend, and eventually grossing $274.2 million worldwide. The film earned over 9 award nominations and won an MTV Movie Award in 2000. Plot In 1991, a group of scientists develop an alternate power source, opening new worlds featuring unique race tracks called the Racing Realms, which can only be accessed by the Wheel of Power. However, the scientists are betrayed by Cortana and are killed in the process. She then takes control of the Racing Drones, a race a dangerous robot drivers. Doc Warren finds a prophesy, showing that a person called "the Speed" will stop Cortana and the Racing Drones. Twelve years later, Jack "Rabbit" Wheeler, a young and hot head, but caring skateboarder moves to Los Angeles, California with his divorced mother and starts a new year at his new school. On his first day at school, Rabbit meets Dexter Carter and Kip Chogi and they become unlikely friends, but get into trouble with the school bullies as well. One day, Rabbit stumbles upon a woman named Keyes who is searching for something in the Stake Park. When he investigates, Rabbit falls into a hole and finds the Wheel of Power. Compelled to touch it, Rabbit starts expericense visions and passes out. He then wakes up to find the Wheel of Power inplanted in his chest and in the custody of Evil Cop, Cortana's lieutenant. There Rabbit learns of Cortana's plan to invade Earth with powerful relics called Starchargers. Keyes rescues Rabbit, believing him to be the Speed, and takes him to Honolulu to meet up with Doc Warren. Rabbit learns that she and the doctor are Sky Drivers-people who build fast and powerful Hot Wheels cars and oppose Cortana. Though disappointed to find Rabbit is not a a sky driver, Keyes and Warren are convinced of his potential when he recalls visions of extraterrestrial beings called Accelerons. Rabbit, is then taken to Dream City, and attends a council of Sky drivers. They are unimpressed with Rabbit and refuse to battle Cortana. Evil Cop's forces attack and capture everyone except for Rabbit and a few others. Rabbit returns to LA and recruits his friends Dexter and Kip and devise a plan to break into Cortana's base to rescue the Sky drivers. They succeed and they all team up to stop Cortana and the Racing Drones. As they race in the Metro Realm, the Drones bring the city to life by causing a power rift to make any machine or electrical appliance come to life. However, the plain backfires and Rabbit and Cortana race head-to-head to the end. As they reach the gate to the world of the Accelerons, Rabbit stops Cortana by hitting her car. Cortana, enraged, attacks Rabbit, but he is saved by Accelerons. The Accelerons return the Wheel of Power to Hot Wheels City and everyone returns home. Rabbit and Keyes become a couple and Garfield and Friends play some movie ending pop music. Cast *Tobey Maguire as Jack "Rabbit" Wheeler. *John Hurt as Doc Warren *Audrey Marie Anderson as Keyes *Angelina Jolie as Cortana. *Paul Walker as Dexter Carter *Christian Bale as Kip Chogi *Ali Larter as Janet Martin *Lorenzo Music as Garfield *Greg Berger as Odie *Thom Huge as Jon Arbuckle *Jon Voight as Mr. Bret K. Magnet *Tony Jay as Kurus Thrain *Michael Benyaer as Professor *Pete Dickson as Pikachu *Alexander Gould as Rupert Bear *Scott Caan as Superman *Grace Park as Wonder woman *Chris O'Donnell as Batman Production Development Hot Wheels: The First Movie was originally conceived in February 1996 by ReBoot series creators Gavin Blair, Ian Pearson, Phil Mitchell, John Grace and directors Dick Zondag and Steve Ball after attending a Auto Show convention in Halifax, Ontario, Canada. After finishing the ReBoot episode "To Mend and Defend", Zondag, Ball, and the Berenstains returned their attention a project based on Hot Wheels. Mainframe went to Warner Bros. Pictures to meet up with then former Warner Bros. president Lorenzo di Bonaventura to pitch their idea for an animated film based on Hot Wheels. At first di Bonaventura wasn't into the project, but then later changed his mind. Warner Bros. Pictures purchased the rights for a film adaptation based on Hot Wheels from Mattel in March 1997, allowing Mainframe to star work immediately. Having been inspired by the success of Toy Story, the crew visited Pixar in Emeryville, California, where they met Pixar CEO John Lasseter, the director of Toy Story. While visiting Pixar, Lasseter gave the crew a lesson on how to make good computer animation by feeling the need and courage. Voice casting Voice casting started in May 1998. Mainframe Entertainment CEO Ian Pearson wanted to have some voices from famous actors heard in the film, for people to recognize. During casting, child actor Pete Dickson auditioned for the film as he was a Hot Wheels fan back then. The crew loved Dickson's acting, they cast him as Pikachu. Later on, Paul Walker and Christian Bale were cast as Dexter Carter and Kip Chogi, respectively. In March 1997, Tobey Maguire was given the lead as Jack "Rabbit" Wheeler In February. Tom Cruise was originally consisted for the role of Rabbit, but the directors felt he wasn't right for it. Lorenzo Music reprised his role as Garfield from the 1980s series Garfield and Friends along with Greg Berger and Thom Huge. Writing Having been inspired by Toy Story being made for children, the directors and producers wanted to hire professional screenwriters that would make the film for children. Animation The film began with animated storyboards to guide the animators in developing the characters. 27 to 38 animators worked on the film, using 400 computer models to animate the characters. Similar to Toy Story s production; recruiting animators for Hot Wheels was brisk; the magnet for talent was not the pay, generally mediocre, but rather the allure of taking part in the first computer-animated feature. Like on how Toy Story created it's characters, each character was either created out of clay or was first modeled off of a computer-drawn diagram before reaching the computer animated design. The animators used the Menv program to set the character into a desired pose. Once a sequence of hand-built poses, or "keyframes", was created, the software would build the poses from the frames in-between. Title controversy On March 1, 1999, a controversy with both Hot Wheels and Pokémon fans rose concerning the film's title. When it was announced on February 28, 1999 that the film would be titled Hot Wheels: The First Movie, there was criticsmm that it's title sounded a lot like Pokémon: The First Movie. Director Zondag released a statement that the reason for the title was because the team felt that Pokemon and Hot Wheels would be more connected to each other if they had the same name. Marketing campaign The first trailer was released in August 1999 and was shown before The Iron Giant and Mystery Men. The second trailer was released in the fall of 1999 and was attached to The Bachelor. Similar to Pokémon: The First Movie's marketing campaign, for the film's theatrical release, select theaters would give away exclusive Hot Wheels toy cars based on the ones from the film, to capitalize on the success of the toy cars. Release Box office Hot Wheels: The First Movie grossed $14,097,106 on it's Wednesday opening day, debuting at number one on the U.S. box office charts. The film achieved $35,053,778 during its first weekend and went on to generate a total of $54,901,882 since its Wednesday launch in 3,054 theaters, averaging to about $14,199 per venue over the three-day span, breaking the record previously held by Pokémon: The First Movie. It also held the record for being the animated feature with the highest-grossing weekend, which would later be broken by Toy Story 2 the next week. Although it dropped to #3 on it's second weekend to $13,971,445, the film came out with $67,386,173 within 11 days. It closed from theaters on February 27, 2000, with $100,112,786 in North America, and $174,101,000 in other territories for a worldwide total of $274,213,786 making it the second highest-grossing computer animated film of 1999 and the fourth highest-grossing animated film of 1999. It was also the highest-grossing film based on a toy line until 2007's Transformers. Home video release The film was released on VHS and DVD on March 25, 2000. A DVD Extended Cut titled, "Extended Play Time Cut", was released on March 28. During it's first week on home video, the film sold over 3.1 million DVD copies. Hot Wheels topped the weekend video sales charts for more than two weeks. In audition, the first week of release VHS rentals totaled $5.1 million. The film was released on Blu-ray with Pokémon: The First Movie as a double feature on November 30, 2009. Reception The film received critical acclaim upon its release. The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 97% approval rating with an average rating of 8.1/10 based on 153 reviews. The film reviews from the audience currently have a 85% "fresh" approval rating. On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 85 out of 100 based on 25 reviews, meaning "generally favorable reviews". The Advertiser‍‍ '‍s Sean Fewster found the visual effects so adorable yet tempting to take on the hardest challenge in a Canadian-American film. Empire‍‍ '‍s Ian Nathan praised Tobey Maguire's performance saying "No tomboy would go through such a risk like Rabbit with Maguire behind the voice". Lorenzo Music, Greg Berger and Thom Huges' reprisals as Garfield, Odie and Jon Arbuckle from the 1980s was well recieved by Garfield and Friends fans. Awards Soundtrack References Category:1999 Category:1999 films